Fall has officially kicked off and we know your time is valuable! Timeslots are precious on our jam-packed calendars. We would not waste our time and we wouldn’t dare waste yours! And yet, we have an awesome monthly tool with The Timothy Group webinars!
Here are five reasons to engage...

On Friday, December 9th, Tabor College of Hillsboro, Kansas dedicated their $13 million Shari Flaming Center for the Arts. Through the determination and enthusiasm of Dr. Jules Glanzer; Ron Braun, VP for Advancement; Trustees, the Advancement team and the entire Tabor family, Tabor completed this...

October 19, 2017
Dear Pat, Kent and our friends at TTG,
At long last, I am writing to express my deep gratitude and satisfaction for the critical role that you played in our Growing Hope Capital Campaign. Your wisdom, experience, and guidance were invaluable as we took...

Excerpts from Growing and Building - Faith, Prayer and Leadership
by Bruce L. Fister, Lieutenant General, USAF, Retired
published 2017 Saquaro Publishing
Officer's Christian Fellowship (OCF) has a vision to positively impact the military through Christ-like leaders. Their mission is to engage military leaders in Biblical fellowship and...

Take a moment to celebrate The Giver of all good gifts as Hope Academy (Minneapolis) marks the launch of construction for a significant expansion. The video features the voices of their elementary students singing "If I Had a Hammer." The video and chart come to...

Congratulations to our friends at Barclay College for successfully completing their $7.5 million capital campaign to fund the Ross-Ellis Center for Arts and Ministry!
Take a peek at the attached for details!
Barclay College 2017
...

If you've been around development work for any amount of time, or have worked with major donors at all, you've probably asked yourself this question - maybe more than once. We have a saying at The Timothy Group (sorry, I don’t know who originated it), “A successful donor visit is when the right person asks the right person for the right amount for the right project in the right place at the right time.”

How do you know when the donor isn't ready? If you've been involved in development work for long, you've probably had a situation where you made the “ask” of a donor before they're weren't ready. How so? A couple of differing ways, probably – either they were offended, said “no”, or gave a significantly smaller amount than you hoped for. No worries, we have all been there a time or two.
Maybe a better question is - how can you know (for next time)? The relationship between a donor, the development staff person or volunteer assigned to the donor, and the institution in need of support is a tricky one. There are guidelines of when a donor is ultimately “ready” for solicitation, but no hard, fast rules. Every donor, every organization, and every campaign is different.

Recently, I was privileged to conduct Pre-Campaign Study interviews on behalf of a client. Essentially, these interviews are one-on-one meetings with their key stakeholders. This capital campaign would be the single largest fundraising effort ever entered into by this organization - the total needs exceeding $5 million. When we conduct these interviews, we ask the stakeholders several questions to gather their perception of the need. These are confidential conversations. We end each interview by asking if they would consider supporting the campaign as described and to estimate what their three-year giving level might look like. These are not pledge commitments, but they do help us to evaluate what the total dollars might project to.